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I HAVE been writing this column on a weekly basis for nearly two and a half years now and one of the first articles that I wrote about is all about attitude.
Basically attitude (approach) to life is everything.
If we have the right attitude to any given situation in life then we are made.
Everybody in life has problems, not everyone has the right attitude yet it must be said that everyone has the potential to change.
The secret is that if someone is to change their attitude the only requirement is that they themselves must first of all want that change. Usually life’s difficulties creates that desire!
Firstly I don’t like to look at things that happen to us in life as problems I prefer to look at them as situations.
A problem is something that you have to think about and this leads on to worry in most human beings (and most people will tell you that there is no real benefit to worry), whereas if you turn it into a situation you can deal with it or park it until you reach a time in life that you can deal with it.
If you can solve it then it is a situation that you can solve (not a problem) and if you can’t solve it you can a) Park it until you can solve it (don’t worry or turn it into a problem!) or b) change the way you look at it (still not a problem). Just a situation you can’t fix right now.
It is part ‘b’ i.e. (change the way you look at it) that I am most interested in writing about here.
There is a powerful video on ‘youtube’ called ‘Welcome The Rain’ . It really is well worth watching and it brings home the real message that I am trying to portray here. Sometimes a picture or an image can explain things far better than ever words can and I think this is one of those situations. There is a phrase that I love to use –‘If you’re explaining you’re losing!) which I believe is apt here.
I often laugh at the irony that my day-job as an optician is to give glasses and change the way people see the world, whereas my job as a life-coach is often to transform the way people (and myself!) view the world.
When we change our perspective (the lenses we look through) in life everything else begins to change along with it.
If we are in trouble we have a choice – keep the same perspective but remember ‘if you always do what you always did you will always get what you always got’.
Ultimately this short (remember the best things come in small parcels!) movie clip – only 3 minutes long is all about changing our perspective and appreciating all we have got even life’s difficulties.
When we change a perceived difficulty in life into one of gratitude then I can only promise you that that is a ‘gamechanger’ in our whole existence.
We are now welcoming life’s difficulties (Welcome The Rain) in the same way that we would welcome sunshine into out lives.
I remember meeting a coach driver in Scotland one time and when the rain stated to pour down he referred to it as ‘Liquid Sunshine’.
• Next week I am going to write about – The Beach Boys!
Excellent! Thank you.